It seems that it’s not only Lytro interested in camera re-focusing technology, with Toshiba coming up with a version that could make the technology possible in your phone or tablet.
Toshiba has been working away at some electronic wizardry lately, creating what appears to be a tiny camera built up of 500,000 tiny lenses.
As reported in Japan’s The Asahi Shimbun, the camera works similarly to an insect eye by making each lens capable of taking a single image, a different image that could show various levels of focus and dimensional, thereby creating a camera that can focus later, similar to the offering put out by Lytro.
Video capability is said to be included with Toshiba’s technology, something which we’ve been told Lytro is working on, but isn’t currently available in production models of Lytro’s first-generation camera.
One thing Toshiba looks to have over Lytro is size: while it’s currently in prototype form, Toshiba is looking to put the re-focus camera module into smartphones and tablets, making it likely that the technology will shrink beyond the size it currently sits in.
